Or lack thereof. As it happens, this illustration I just finished is a perfect fit for the theme this week. I call it "Bored Queen."

If you would like to see my illustration method, I walk through the process of creating "Bored Queen" in my frequently asked questions section of my website: http://dulemba.com/index_faq.html. This illustration took me about two days.

Gaads I love this character. This is Great Dane Dipsi. Her story isn't quite there, but I just love her attempts to reinvent herself. Hits home with me at least. The unsure chihuahua looking on is Bernard - namesake for our dog, Bernie.

We awoke at 5:00 am to make sure I got there on time. It was a two 1/2 hour drive to the Dekalb County Library. If my husband hadn't driven me down there, I never would have made it. I've grown way too accustomed to these country roads. When we arrived, there was reserved parking and I was immediately greeted and led to a "green room." Gotta love the special treatment. I did listen to the opening speaker, Carmen Deedy. She really is as wonderful as I've always heard. I met with the other illustrators on the board before our talk, and we all got along wonderfully. What talents: Sheila AldridgeLaura KnorrMichael Montgomery The talk went well and had a nice turn-out. Book signing afterwards was fun. Books were on sale by Chapter 11. All in all, it was an incredibly slick event and I imagine will grow in popularity over the years.

I drew this a while back, just for fun. It gets a strong response when people see it. I suppose it resonates in some way, perhaps especially because this little fairy does look so "alone." Everybody can relate to that.

Woohoo! THE PRINCE'S DIARY is now available for pre-orders on Amazon. This is my first published picture book, so I'm pretty excited about it. I've created computer wallpaper which is available at my downloads page. Now the promotional side begins. This is where my graphic design background kicks in. That's fun too.

Amazing site. I can't imagine how long it took them to pull this together. These are folk sounds from all over the world. You can click on a region, choose a culture, or instrument you want to hear - and up come hundreds of sound bytes. You can purchase the entire "songs" if you want to. Just browsing through the collection is illuminating. Try it out: http://www.smithsonianglobalsound.org/geocache.asp

I love to travel. I've been fortunate enough to see Europe several times, and even Africa, but some of my best travels have been in books. The airfare is better of course. So, yesterday was a lazy day at Moonshine Lodge. Ironically enough, what did I end up doing? Drawing - with a pencil no less. I can't tell you how many times I tried to hit "edit-undo." I created this little girl, and a drawing I sent off to SCBWI. Seems they're low on b/w illustrations for the Bulletin. Hm.